Steve O

Avoid at all costs

Unethical dealership, avoid at all costs. After a car breakdown I needed something temporary to do the school run, so found an old VW Golf on autotrader for £925. The dealer was First Line Cars. I spoke to them, and the dealer told me the only thing wrong with it was the roof didn't extract (it's a convertible). The ad also described it as 'runs smooth' and it had an MOT. It was delivered at 10pm so I didn't get to check it out until the next day - when I discovered it had a lot of problems, with loads of different noises coming from different areas of the car. The dealer ignored my original contact attempts, and then started shouting at me saying "what did you expect for a car at that price" when I called him - then on messages said I should have known it was a project, and that the fault is mine for not knowing enough about cars. We had to go through our credit card company for a refund. They asked me to get it checked by a mechanic, who came back with a very long list of extremely serious issues, concluding that it was not safe to be on the road... and that these issues would have been present in the time of the MOT despite them not being mentioned. The refund is sorted, but the dealer refuses to collect the car. The V5 ownership transfer was stopped with the DVLA, so ownership is still with First Line Cars. First they told me to drive it back to them, I refused as it's not safe to drive (which you can easily tell from even attempting to drive it). The dealer complained of the cost of delivery, so I offered £50 as a good will gesture to contribute to collection - at first he agreed to this, then decided not to. It has been on my drive for over a month and they won't pick it up. The dealer still complains that it's unfair on him, wanting me to pay far more towards recovery - not seeming to realise that legally, and ethically, the costs are on him because it was delivered and rejected as mis-sold the next day, and that I would not have bought it if he had not been dishonest about the condition. I am having to go through a number of channels, reporting them to the DVSA for the fake MOT, the AA standards for their use of the logo on their site when they don't adhere to the standards, and taking legal advice on how to get them to take their car back. Be very careful in dealing with this dealer, they are extremely unethical and unreasonable.